Millennials Continue to Leave Big Cities

[JManc]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

Not sure if I fully agree with you; those early 80s Yuppies were already into urban living... YUPpies were Young Urban Professionals after all. And then there were the artist-types that were moving into warehouses and industrial sections of cities in the early 80s; that's how the Arts District was formed in LA. So I think by the late 1970s/early 1980s, younger people were already starting to reject the boring cookie-cutter suburbs and mall-ification that the Baby Boomers had embraced.

I'm a Gen-Xer (born in 1970), and even when I was a teen, my friends and I talked about leaving the goddamn suburbs and moving to the big city... but at the time for me, that meant an apartment or bungalow in or near West Hollywood. Maybe my generation was split between liking the suburbs and liking the city. I definitely wanted to get out of postwar-era suburbia.

I'm not that far behind you (born in '73) and moved to Houston in 1997 and 'urban living' was virtually non-existent here and living right in town was extremely affordable because it wasn't that particularly desirable or special. That changed by the mid-2000's and it's a dramatically different experience now. I grew up in the suburbs as well and everyone hated them and wanted out but very few actually made it out. NYC was very sketchy when I was in high school in the early 90's and even there, urban living was very niche and those that did it braved the ups and downs of living in the city at the time. Plus, there were very few craft beer joints, Korean BBQ's and yoga classes.

[Crawford]

There has always been some wealth in big cities, of course. Even in the worst years of the 70's, there was very significant wealth in Manhattan, and to a lesser extent in Chicago, Boston, DC, SF. Gentrification was in full swing in the late 70's, in certain areas, but yeah, cities still sucked overall.

[dubu]

i think back in the day cities got better the older they were, now the older cities are the worse they are. because not everyone can or needs to live in the city now and theres nothing new, its kinda outdated. cars arent going to be the future, skyscrapers are going to be less and less amazing to people.

[SFBruin]

Hopefully this will lead to a rise in ridership of commuter rail, the best mode of rail.

[SFTransplant]

Got married 5 years ago when I was 26 and promptly moved to the SF suburbs and have lots of friends doing the same. My friends who are a tad bit older that kids who are Gen Z'ers, says all their kids want to do is live in the city. Just how things work I guess...

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I'm not totally convinced there is a mass movement of millennials to the burbs. The drops could also be a factor of stricter immigration, or a decline in desire to relocate to the U.S. by foreigners. People think white American young professional when they see "millennial", but that could miss immigrants of a certain age that are moving to other parts of the world (or returning home). The big expensive cities are more dependent on foreign-born populations to grow.

International immigration to the US has barely budged in 3 years...

[chris08876]

Kinda a failure of big cities to not retain such residents, but can you blame the migration out of the cores? Certain metros have been and will continue to be expensive nodes where its just not financially feasible or wise for folks that participate in the activity of producing a unit, aka a kid. This will raise costs and make life harder for folks financially (along with other quality of life factors), and so they flock to where its cheaper and one doesn't have to struggle as much.

It would be nice if our cities worked on creating the conditions needed for a nice middle-class life, and some do... but the top cities... its tough. For the majority that is. Forget those folks in top-companies or top-niches pulling in the big bucks that can afford certain areas and live comfortably.

The bottom line is that the average folks will go to areas that satisfy their demand for better quality of life. Either if it comes to housing or jobs or schools or just plain low-noise and nature.

[jtown,man]

If you end up having two kids you want:
More space
Car
Good schools

More space in the city cost a lot.
A car in a city can be expensive or burdensome.
Private school for two kids can be 20k+ a year.

The costs of the city simply add up too quickly. No wonder people say screw it and moe to the burbs where they are paying a lot less for housing and have decent schools.

[Sam Hill]

Originally Posted by RavioliAficionado

Obviously that is a hyperbolic example, but when you consider the prices of many cities the question often is less who WANTS to be there and more who can AFFORD to be there.

Yep. Especially once a bun is in the oven...

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

Private school for two kids can be 20k+ a year.

Yeah, right. Try 100k a year. Elite private schools are approaching 55-60k in annual tuition alone. And they want additional help with "fundraising".

[SFBruin]

Originally Posted by SFTransplant

Got married 5 years ago when I was 26 and promptly moved to the SF suburbs and have lots of friends doing the same. My friends who are a tad bit older that kids who are Gen Z'ers, says all their kids want to do is live in the city. Just how things work I guess...

I grew up in Daly City, which is a suburb just outside of San Francisco. When I was in high school, I wanted nothing more than to move into San Francisco where all of the apartment buildings and "fun" was.

Now that I'm old enough to decide where to live, I don't even want to live in SF. I'd rather live in Concord or some place like that. :/

[ocman]

Gen Z are just living in places they can afford. They grew up during the recession after all. They’re the pragmatic generation. They don’t want to pay 50% of their income in rent to live like their “I’m gonna live forever" Millennial parents. With cities making only half-assed attempts at solving the housing crisis, they’ve become hostile environments for young adults who can’t even dream of owning property in these places. Not worth having 10 different boba shops to choose from.

Also the rampant homelessness is just depressing.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Yeah, right. Try 100k a year. Elite private schools are approaching 55-60k in annual tuition alone. And they want additional help with "fundraising".

I just googled how much it costs and picked Tennessee as an example.

Not everyone sending their kids to private schools are going for the "elite" brand though lol some just want a school where their kid feels safe and they will learn enough to make it to college.

[Sun Belt]

The article is talking about the decline of the age group that is currently 25 - 39. The upper end of the age group is [surprise surprise], moving to the suburbs while the younger half, those that don't have the same financial responsibilities as the older half are moving into the city, from the suburbs [post college years].


Millennials will do the same thing that previous generations did once they start getting married and starting a family. In the title it states: "many still leaving for cheaper housing, better schools".

Just after college, you're not concerned with "The Three S's": schools, safety and savings. That comes later in life when you have a wife and children.

WTS, people today are putting off marriage by a few years and putting off having children and are having less children.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

International immigration to the US has barely budged in 3 years...

Not sure where you heard that:

The United States population gained immigrants at the slowest pace in a decade last year, according to an analysis of new census data, a notable slowdown that experts said was quite likely linked to a more restrictive approach by the Trump administration.

The net increase of immigrants in the American population dropped to about 200,000 people in 2018, a decline of more than 70 percent from the year before, according to William Frey, chief demographer at the Brookings Institution, who conducted the analysis.

“It’s remarkable,” said David Bier, an immigration expert at the Cato Institute, of the 2018 numbers. “This is something that really hasn’t happened since the Great Recession. This should be very concerning to the administration that its policies are scaring people away.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/u...migration.html

A prolonged decrease in immigration would have a disproportionate effect on big cities, especially New York, since those are the places that immigrants settled into. Places in the Sun Belt might be able to mask immigration drops with domestic migration, but places like Dallas and Houston would also probably experience much slower growth than in the recent past.

[DCReid]

I don't think that article tells us anything. It states cities over 500K lost a total of nearly 30K residents in that age group. In addition to high cost cities like NY, cities like Las Vegas and Houston lost people, while cities like Austin and San Antonio gained residents. I read the article in the library (it was short) and even LA, Denver and Seattle gained residents. Are LA, Denver, Austin and Seattle cheaper than LV and Houston? I think the movement of residents from expensive areas to cheaper smaller populations - like some west coasters moving to Boise and Salt Lake City; Chicago to Columbus, Des Moines; NY to perhaps Atlanta and FL and TX (which has been going on for decades.

[Steely Dan]

* posts deleted *

For the love of God, would you idiots PLEASE keep your stupid fucking political axe-grinding in the current events shit hole. We're trying to have a city discussions forum here.

If you refuse to stop, suspensions/bans will be forthcoming.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Yeah, right. Try 100k a year. Elite private schools are approaching 55-60k in annual tuition alone.

Regular old middle class people don't send their kids to elite private schools, they send their kids to catholic school if they don't wanna do public schools in the city.

My good friend is a plumber and his wife does HR for a non-profit (solidly middle class family), and they got two kids in their parish grammar school to the tune of ~$12,000/year for BOTH of them.

Now, there will be a big jump for them if they do the catholic school thing for high school as well, but it's still a FAR cry from $55K per year per kid.

[Obadno]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Not sure where you heard that:



A prolonged decrease in immigration would have a disproportionate effect on big cities, especially New York, since those are the places that immigrants settled into. Places in the Sun Belt might be able to mask immigration drops with domestic migration, but places like Dallas and Houston would also probably experience much slower growth than in the recent past.

Immigration has always ebbed and flowed, the difference is especially after the 1960's we had policies actively enticing immigrants this is the first time in a very long time that policy as shifted away from outright support to indifference.

Of course the foreign press pounding home the message that the USA is currently "anti immigrant" probably doesn't help either

[craigs]

Catholic schools will also give out steep discounts for families with more than one student in school, or at least they did when I was a kid.

So Millennials are tens of millions strong and I guess the largest generation of many at this point. But what can we really infer from data showing 30,000 of that particular generation once lived in cities of 500,000+ but no longer do? One possible conclusion: people just like to discuss Millennials and what they ruin do.